Saudi Potential Excites Middle East Events Industry

The Kingdom is investing $64 billion in entertainment the sector: Mohamed Tayem

Dubai, UAE, April 2019: Event industry experts and thought leaders discussed the immense opportunities in the Saudi Arabia at the Middle East Special Event and Exhibition held recently in Dubai.

“The entertainment and events industry in Saudi Arabia is poised to boost diversification of the state’s revenues with consumer spending on the sector expected to reach 36 billion Saudi riyals ($9.6 billion) by 2030”, said Mohamed Tayem Founder and Manging Director of Entourage, the leading live communication agency in the region.

The Kingdom set a clear target to increase household spending on entertainment and cultural activities inside the country from 2.9 percent to 6 percent by 2030, according to its Vision 2030 National Transformation Program.

“We are witnessing a big surge in positive momentum ever since His Royal Highness, Prince Mohammed Bin Salman mandated the entertainment and events industry to become a key engine of economic growth in line with the goals of Saudi Vision 2030”, Tayem added.

“The Kingdom will pump $64 billion into the emerging entertainment and events sector as a part of Vision 2030”, added Tayem. “Saudi Arabia currently spends $22 billion on tourism and entertainment and wide scale efforts are underway to build a strong local entertainment industry. “

According to GEA, the Kingdom hosted more than 2,000 events in 2017 counting an attendance of more than 8 million, with 149 event providers and vendors active behind the scenes.

After a series of new business acquisitions, performing ahead of the market and marking a successful year in 2018, the most exciting live marketing agency in Dubai, entourage, has expanded its business operations in Saudi Arabia.

“This is the year of Saudi”, said Entourage marketing and events chief Mohammed Tayem. “In line with the leadership vision of Saudi Arabia, and with trillion dollar investments towards boosting the economy, we are very excited to be partners of the most ambitious growth story in the world.”

The Saudi expansion of the regional marketing leader was being planned for years. In 2017, the agency partnered with the office of the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, leaders of MiSK Foundation to manage the biggest social media forum in the Kingdom, the Shoof Forum. The mandate was to mobilise and empower the youth of the Kingdom providing them with the best in the world inspirations. Snapchat, Netflix, YouTube are among the leading brands that the agency worked with to script the success of the major youth campaign.

Established in 2008, entourage has quickly grown into one of the leading live communication agencies in the region activating the most talked about campaigns. Take the landmark Egypt Tourism campaign “Wahashtoona” and “Misr Orayba” for example that helped Egypt leap back into the tourism landscape. The agency is ranked number one according to DubaiSME100 index for business performance. Recognized by the marketing and communication community, from Middle East Event Awards to Middle East PR Awards to MENA effie, Dubai Lynx and internationally at Euro EACA Care awards, the agency is proud of its long-standing partnerships that include Google, Snapchat, Prime Minister’s Office, Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Knowledge Foundation, International Humanitarian City and many more brands and entities.

The Saudi Vision 2030 outlines clear plans to make lives better through the channels of culture, sports, health, education and housing. The agency is already partnering with various government departments and ministries to communicate the vision within the Kingdom and globally.

“We understand what it means to deliver success. We believe in ownership of the process, not outsourcing,” said Tayem. This means, Entourage has invested heavily in developing local capacity and expertise in the Kingdom to be able to manage expectations of ambitious projects, within strict restrictions of time. The agency expanded by adding 1000 sqm of production facilities, which is equipped with state of the art assets with high-end digital production, carpentry, content development and videography solutions at the disposal of agency partners.

Team Entourage is able to deliver ambitious visions at scale. Create a conference from content, agenda and experience design scope of work to ensuring the highest standards of outcomes for activations and integrated campaigns through its owned production assets.